Congolese performance artist wins political asylum in US
HARTFORD, Conn. — For a week, Toto Kisaku was held in a darkened Congolese cell, detained for putting on plays critical of the African nation’s government. One at a time, his fellow inmates were led away to their deaths. Kisaku feared he would be executed next until he was set free by a guard who recognized him from his performances.
After fleeing with his young son, Kisaku came to the United States, where this month he was granted asylum by immigration authorities.
A show based on what he endured in Congo, “Requiem for an Electric Chair,” is scheduled to open in June at the International Festival of Art and Ideas in New Haven, Connecticut. The one-man play touches on the thoughts that raced through his mind during his imprisonment, with mannequins on stage standing in for the cellmates whose faces he could not make out in the dark.
“I want to show people what happens to people who are waiting to be executed. Two minutes before you are executed, what are you seeing? What are you thinking about the world?” he said. “How you are thinking of your family, people who love you, people who don’t love you.”